To mount a production that harnessed the next evolution in filmmaking, director
Weitz and the filmmakers assembled a team of artists, technicians and craftspeople
to hand-craft the parallel world in which The Golden Compass unfolds.

Oscar-winning
production designer Dennis Gassner worked with Weitz to conceptualize
everything from Oxford colleges to the vast snowy wastes of
the far north, home of the armored bears; from the sophistication
of Mrs. Coulter’s London
to the bustle of the Northern port of Trollesund, and on to the ice palace of
the King of the Bears, Ragnar Sturlusson, and Bolvangar, where Lyra finds the
kidnapped children. The project would require hundreds of people to create a
world with depth and scope from scratch, and bring the characters and their daemons
to perfectly syncopated life utilizing a combination of practical and digital
effects, as well as a working alethiometer – the golden compass of the
title – and zeppelins, carriages, sky ferries, armored bears, spy flies,
boats, barges and inconceivable machinery and artistry of a parallel age.

“The whole project is about translation – translation from something
you would understand into something that is in a different vernacular,” notes
Gassner. “So, it’s a new signature, looking into another world
that seems familiar but is still unique. There’s a term I use – called
cludging – it’s taking one element and combining it with another
element to make something new. It’s a hybrid or amalgamation, and that’s
what this movie is about from a design perspective. It’s about amalgamating
ideas and concepts and theoretical and physical environments.”

Gassner and his team - headed by art directors Richard Johnson, Andrew
Nicholson and Chris Lowe, set decorator Anna Pinnock, property master Barry
Gibbs, and construction manager Andrew Evans – set about bringing the book’s
diverse world to life.

To
conceptualize Jordan College, Gassner utilized exteriors from
existing architecture in Oxford, Greenwich and Chatham, along
with interiors built from the ground up at Shepperton Studios. “I first came to Oxford with
Philip Pullman as my guide and he knows the college and the city better than
anyone,” recalls Gassner.

“People who have worked on and read the books and worked on the project,
they’ve come to the project because they loved the books. The director
and I have discussed the emotional fabric of this film at great length, now
it’s just a matter of getting that fabric made.”

Some sets were fashioned practically at the stately Hedsor House, in Buckinghamshire. “We’ve
basically used the structure of the house but changed everything to adapt it
for the world that we’re creating,” says Gassner. Another essential
practical location was London’s Park Lane Hotel, the backdrop for the
restaurant scene and the beauty parlor.

In
the foundry, numerous versions of the film’s enigmatic machine called
the alethiometer were forged. The alethiometer is “a time piece, a
magnetic piece,” describes Gassner. “It’s an emotional
piece really. The history of time has been unique in terms of evolution,
so we wanted to create a magical piece that belonged in the time family.”

Pullman took Gassner to the Museum of Mechanical Pieces to show him some
artifacts that formed the inspiration of the piece. “In a sense, the alethiometer
is the fusion of all of that,” the production designer explains. “It’s
the sum of all the parts. A lot of people on my team worked out the symbology
and how it works and how Lyra uses it. It’s become just one small piece
in the puzzle. And our journey on this project is to find the right piece in
every case.”

The objects were first modeled on a computer, then processed through a
cutting-edge rapid prototype machine, which renders out of resin a 3-D
model from the computer. The model was then refined, engraved, acid-etched
and painted in varying degrees of detail. “Some of them needed to be read, others needed to be dropped
or just carried around in Lyra’s pouch,” says prop master Barry Gibbs. “The
alchemical marks on the object needed to be precise, so we went to engravers
to create those.”

The
bears’ armor was likewise brought to life in the foundry after
the bears themselves – and their armor – were carved into life-sized
maquette sculptures that could then be scanned into the computer.

Similar
maquettes were made for each daemon, from Lyra’s Pan to Mrs.
Coulter’s golden monkey. Only dog daemons were performed by trained
animals.

Designing
the artifacts of a parallel world was, for Gassner and his
team, “new,
interesting, exciting and stimulating for all of us to look at, especially
working with the young actor playing Lyra, who gets to take a journey through
this world.”

Ruth Myers, a two-time Oscar nominee whose credits include L.A. Confidential
and Emma, worked closely with director Weitz and Gassner to create costumes
that would be at once unfamiliar yet totally consistent with Lyra’s world. “I
talked to Chris Weitz about playing with fabrics so things weren’t quite
recognizable, not just home spun and hessian,” she describes. “We
were painting and printing and dyeing so the fabrics we used were unique. We’d
talked about the Gyptians and wanting to give them some ethnicity, a sense that
they came from all sorts of different places. With Mrs. Coulter, we talked about
the most glamorous time she could exist, and looked at movie stars of the ‘30s
and ‘40s. The costumes evolved.”

As
chaotic as the robes of Serafina Pekkala, the witch queen,
the garment of the Magisterial Emmissary would conversely need
to represent the picture of authority in Lyra’s world. Even Lyra’s
transformation, from ruffian through her makeover by Mrs. Coulter
and eventual bearing to the north, would need to precisely
reflect her growing sense of self-awareness.

She found a responsive and knowledgeable collaborator in director Weitz. “Chris
has a very sophisticated and intelligent visual reference,” Myers notes. “He
is possibly the first director I’ve worked with who you can throw a piece
of really esoteric references and his own background of culture is so strong
that he picks that up. I’ve loved working with him.”

“Ruth’s work is beautiful,” says Weitz. “I felt that
the costumes should feel like the best of every era brought forward and given
a hybrid twist. Ruth’s work was detailed to an incredible degree; everything
feels lived-in and absolutely right.”

Since everything would need to be created, Myers set up shop on-site in
Shepperton. “I
thought the only way we could do it was being part of the art department and
opening up a huge workshop,” she recalls.

Make-up
and hair design were entrusted to Peter King, an Oscar winner
for his work on New Line Cinema’s Lord of the Rings,
who was well equipped to find the right look for a raft of
different characters in parallel universes.